Digital agency creative appoints Tanja Lategan MD

Matthew Gregory

Digital Agency Creative Spark has appointed Tanja Lategan as new Managing Director, who will steer the digital agency through its next phase of growth and ramp up the company’s integrated marketing offering.

Creative Spark, acquired by the M&C Saatchi Group in 2015, is a Johannesburg and Cape Town-based specialist digital agency partnering with clients Philips, Kimberly-Clark, EOH and Gautrain. More recently the agency has been appointed the digital transformation partner for Medscheme and full-service digital agency for the Danone stable of brands which includes NutriDay, Ultramel and YogiSip.

Tanja Lategan will oversee the delivery and continued growth of the seven-year old agency comprising of about 60 people that provides strategic digital solutions, creative digital design, web and app development to clients in both South Africa, across the continent, and within the M&C Saatchi network.

Tanks Lategan comes with 14-years digital experience – most recently heading up Primedia Online, where she was responsible for the launch of sales agency Dash of Lime and founded the content marketing business Juice Content, which subsequently grew into a fully-fledged digital marketing agency, servicing the likes of Adidas, Old Mutual, Cell C, Yahoo! and Telkom.

Matthew Buckland, the outgoing Managing Director and founder of Creative Spark, moves into a group role as Founder and Chief Exec: Digital, with a focus on key Creative Spark clients and group digital clients.

Tanja Lategan started working in the digital technology industry 14 years ago. Her career in digital marketing kicked off with Naspers’ Touchline Media in 2006, where she played a vital role in building and growing their digital media department. In 2008 she was approached by Primedia Online and accepted the position of Commercial Director, where she assumed responsibility for all the commercial activities within the company.

In 2010 Lategan was responsible for the launch of a new business unit called Dash of Lime which she grew into serious contender in the digital advertising sales space, signing on clients such as IOL, E! Entertainment, CBS, Cosmopolitan, Marie Claire, Oprah Magazine, The Daily Mail, Ster Kinekor, KFM, 947 (Highveld), Cape Talk, 702, Eye Witness News and Computicket.

In 2011 Lategan was promoted to the position of Chief Executive Officer of Primedia Online, which included managing the iafrica publishing business, as well as the 365 Digital advertising technology business, in addition to running the Dash of Lime advertising sales agency.

In 2012 Lategan identified an opportunity to launch a content marketing agency to take advantage of this new fast growing area in the digital space. Under Tanja’s leadership, Juice Content grew into a fully-fledged digital marketing agency offering content strategy & production, design & development, social media, direct marketing, PPC & SEO, analytics and marketing automation, servicing the likes of Adidas, Old Mutual, Cell C, Yahoo! and Telkom. In 2013 she was selected as one of the Mail & Guardian’s top 200 Young South Africans, a prestigious award that aims to recognise the leaders of tomorrow, “people who challenge themselves by finding innovated ways to solve problems and are likely to impact public life, business and civil society for decades to come.”

In 2014 InspiringWomen named Lategan the most inspiring woman of the month and in 2016 she was nominated as one of the most influential women in Digital Marketing as part of Burn Media’s All Star Series.

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